The U.S. government is using the electoral victory of Hamas as an occasion to again intensify its pressure against the Palestinian people.

The U.S. loudly condemns Hamas as “terrorist” and insists that the Palestinians must renounce their armed struggle against Israeli occupation and aggression before they can be considered “legitimate.”

The “logic” of U.S. imperialism is beyond hypocrisy. The U.S.-Israeli aggressors can grab Palestinian land, kill Palestinian children – in fact colonize the entire country and subjugate the people. But the Palestinians have no right to resist and fight for their rights, their very existence.

And not just in Palestine. U.S. imperialism invades Iraq, sets up a colonial regime, kills a 100,000+ civilians, and condemns any Iraqi who resists as a “terrorist.” In Afghanistan too, the patriots who fight against U.S. aggression are “terrorists;” in Haiti, those who oppose the U.S.-U.N. occupation are “gangs;” etc.

This is the law of all colonialists and slavemasters. They make war to oppress and enslave the peoples while insisting that the oppressed have no right to fight for their freedom.

The right to resist, the right of oppressed peoples to rise, arms-in-hand, against imperialism, is an inviolable right, recognized even in international law. But it is also more than this.

In today's world, the liberation struggles of the oppressed nations – the revolutionary movement of the Palestinian people, the Iraqi people, the Haitian people, etc., – are a great motive force for progress and democracy. When the peoples defeat the occupiers and assert their sovereignty, they turn their country from a base for imperialism and war into a base for peace, equality and friendship.

Wholeheartedly supporting these struggles is one of the touchstones of a thorough-going anti-war, anti-imperialist movement. (First published 2/14/06)